US Africa Command forms "military relationship" with Libya

In a statement issued June 19 at its Stuttgart headquarters, US Africa Command chief Gen. Carter F. Ham said last year's Operation Odyssey Dawn, the NATO mission in Libya, "imparted important lessons [for] the Defense Department's newest combatant command" and said it "welcomes a new African partner to the fold while still dealing with some of the residual challenges left by the former regime." Gen. Ham said that AfriCom "is forming a new military-to-military relationship with the Libyans and is working to strengthen its long-term military-to-military relationship with the Tunisians." Speaking about the Pentagon's future role on the African continent, Ham stated: "It is probably not going to be very often where Africa Command goes to the more kinetic, the more offensive operations in Africa. But nonetheless, we have to be ready to do that if the president requires that of us." (US Africa Command, June 19 via AllAfrica)

Grave human rights concerns persist in post-Qaddafi Libya, even as the media spotlight has moved on. Many of the 300-plus inmates at the notorious Tajura prison, 10 miles east of Tripoli,, have been detained since October 2011 without trial, or charges. In March, regular army troops took over the facility from the militiamen who had been running it since Qaddafi's fall. But three months later, none of the inmates have been either charged or released. (Al-Monitor, June 18)

A Libyan human rights group has condemned the killing of a judge investigating last year's murder of a defected long-time aide to Moammar Qaddafi. The Libyan Observatory for Human Rights said the National Transitional Council was responsible for the killing of Jumah Hasan al-Jazwi, who was shot dead on June 21, on his way to a mosque in Benghazi. He was investigating last year's murder of Gen. Abdel Fattah Younes. In a statement the Observatory said that the NTC is deliberately delaying uncovering the circumstances around Younes' killing. (BBC News, June 22)